I was born 87 years ago. For 65 years I've ruled as Tamriel's emperor, but for all these years, I've never been the ruler of my own dreams. I have seen the gates of Oblivion, beyond which no waking eyes may see. Behold! In darkness, a doom sweeps the land. This is the 27th of Last Seed, the Year of Akatosh 433. These are the closing days of the Third Era... and the final hours of my life.

The game places you in the role of a prisoner, convicted of an unknown crime and incarcerated in the dungeons of the Imperial City. Your imprisonment is cut short by the arrival of Emperor Uriel Septim (played by Patrick Stewart) and his bodyguards, the Blades, fleeing assassins who are trying to eliminate the royal family. Their escape route just happens to lead through your cell.

What follows is a lengthy quest to save the province of Cyrodiil, heart land of the Empire which spans the whole continent of Tamriel, from destruction at the hands of Mehrunes Dagon, the Daedric prince of destruction.

The game boasts a huge open world with sixteen square miles of terrain to explore, hundreds of dungeons, eight cities filled with NPCs that have their own daily routine and enough quests to fill hundreds of hours of play time.

The player has the opportunity to join several factions, such as the Fighter’s Guild, and all have their own storylines spanning several quests.

The game received a universally positive critical response, the PC and Xbox 360 versions holding Metacritic scores of 94. The response from players was also generally positive, but the opinions of long-time fans of the series was more mixed, as many of them thought the game was too simplified compared to the previous installment in the franchise, Morrowind.

The game has spawned a huge and dedicated modding community that still continues to churn out content rapidly. These mods range from new items to complete overhauls of the game.

The game launched during a turning point in the medium, and served as a guinea pig of sorts for the Xbox Live Marketplace and Downloadable Content, receiving a significant amount of new content, ranging from player homes, to a whole new story arc in the form of Knights of the Nine, which was eventually released on PC as well. The game also received full expansion called Shivering Isles, dealing with Sheogorath, the Daedric prince of madness, in 2007.

In the vicinity of the Black Horse Courier offices, you are given the new topic "Do you need couriers?", which was obviously part of an intended quest. However, the question never appears in your dialogue options.

There is also a cave that can't be explored as a door is locked and there is no key in the game. Dialog indicates there was to be a quest involving a Red Queen and Black Queen- the Black Queen was to live in the cave. Cheating your way through- either by using the console to unlock the door, clipping through, or using paintbrushes to get through the secondary entrance- reveals a cave that's completed but not quite finished in terms of final content.

The game quickly dispenses with plot points which had been set up in Morrowind and its expansion packs. Uriel Septim either recovered from his illness, or it hadn't progressed to a critical stage before he was assassinated. The Succession Crisis among his sons that was implied didn't end up being an issue, as the Mythic Dawn cult killed all of them before the game even began.

There are notably no female Nords, Orcs, or Redguards anywhere in the Shivering Isles, not even as generic NPCs. Apparently, Lynda Carter and Gayle Jessup (who respectively voiced the female Nords and Orcs, and female Redguards) weren't available when voice recording for the Shivering Isles expansion began.

Also, while most of the males of the ten playable races (barring only the Bretons) have new dialogue recorded for Knights of the Nine, only the females of the Imperial race have new dialogue as well (which is strange, since the female Bretons have the exact same voice actress and voice type as the female Imperials, yet don't have anyKotN-related dialogue assigned to them). Some of the plug-ins try to hide this by recycling voice clips from already-existing NPCs when the appropriate voice actor isn't available for recording, but it's fairly obvious at times when the dialogue was lifted from someplace else in the game.

Absurdly Spacious Sewer: The Imperial Capital is built over the ruins of an Ayleid city, so in this case it's actually justified.

Adoring the Pests: One of the first Fighter's Guild quests sends you to help out a woman who has a 'rat problem' in her basement. Turns out she actually likes having the rats down there; the problem is the mountain lions that keep killing them.

It's also a reference to Morrowind, as a woman with a similar name asks you to kill a few rats for the first fighter's guild quest.

Mankar Camoran. He seems to have some respect for the player at times.

Most people you meet in the Dark Brotherhood as well. They're murderous, bloodthirsty sociopaths, but they're also very charming and chummy. Somewhat ironically, the only one of this cabal of assassins who openly dislikes you is the resident merchant.

Vampires. Since vampirism takes three days to fully take hold, and a very simple spell (or common potion) is all that's needed to arrest it, the majority of Tamrielic vampires wanted to turn into cannibalistic horrors.

Amazon Brigade: The Shivering Isles are policed by two of them, no less, the Golden Saints (Auriel) and Dark Seducers (Mazken). There are males... but they're rare, subservient to the females, and statistically weaker. Additionally, due to a scripting error when you become Duke or Duchess of Mania/Dementia the two groups will greet or refer to you only in the feminine. It's "fixed" in the Unofficial Patch, for those that don't find it entertaining.

Ambiguously Brown: Or perhaps Ambiguously Blue, in this case. There are a few NPCs running around which either had their races incorrectly flagged in the CS, or are showing signs of mixed heritage. One noteworthy example is a guard seen in Anvil (who guards the chapel and warns people of the scene inside with KOTN installed) who is definitely a Redguard in skin tone and appearance but has an Imperial voice. Cutter, the emo Dementia blacksmith in Shivering Isles, looks to be a Dunmer, but has yellow eyes(the CS lists her race as Bosmer). There are also two female Dementia residents, both Imperial, who have blue skin tones.

And I Must Scream: A Wizard stole from Vaermina the Daedric Prince of Nightmares. Now he's trapped within nightmares for all eternity.

One merchant in Crucible also suggests doing this to you via Chronomancy- trapping your body in time while keeping their mind intact. Thankfully, you can't accept his offer.

And Your Reward Is Clothes: Several quests. Notably completing the central plotline, awards you a custom suit of Imperial Dragon armor, which by that point is probably considerably weaker than what you are already wearing.

Annoying Arrows: After taking a few arrows to the gut, you'll resemble a living pincushion but can still move around perfectly normally. Even with an arrow right through your crotch. If you shoot someone in the head and they don't die or see you, they'll just walk back to where they were with the arrow still sticking out of their heads. Because it "must have been the wind."

Anti-Hero: You can potentially be one, if you gain a lot of infamy points by doing evil things and generally be a dick, at the same time that you're saving the empire. You can also go right past this, straight into Villain Protagonist. The game is sometimes criticized for allowing players to be the Thieves', Mages', Dark Brotherhood's, AND Fighters' guild leader while also being a vampire, god of madness, hunter of Vampires, Arena Champion, Hero of the Imperium, AND the man who serves food to prisoners for 5 gold a week. Skyrim went out of its way to make it impossible to play both sides.

Apocalypse Cult: The Mythic Dawn seek to summon Mehrunes Dagon, the daedric prince of destruction in order to "purify" Tamriel. To do that, they are trying to break down the barriers between Nirn and Oblivion by murdering the Emperor and all his heirs, who are essential to keeping the barriers in place.

Arbitrary Mission Restriction: The Dark Brotherhood questline uses the "optional objectives" variant. Players are free to kill the targets any way they please, but with every target after Rufio and Captain Gaston Tussaud—until the player becomes Lucien Lachance's Silencer—there's a bonus added to the payment (usually a magic item) if the kill is carried out in the specified manner (e.g. to Make It Look Like an Accident in "Accidents Happen").

Artifact Title: Averted... in a manner of speaking. It is the first Elder Scrolls game since Arena where the actual Elder Scrolls are seen, but they still don't play a part in the Main Quest, but rather in the Thieves Guild quest line. You get to steal one!

An especially amusing one can randomly occur while sneaking around in Bandit lairs. After the main quest is completed, there's a random chance that certain of the bandits might start singing a song in your honor. That won't stop them from trying to kill you once you're spotted. Lampshaded by some of the idle dialogue (which unfortunately you never hear due to an oversight. A mod that fixes that can be found here)

The Radiant AI system is commendably ambitious, but it does fall flat very frequently and very visibly. Part of the problem is that NPC behavior is driven by motivations. One quest involving vampire hunters can be botched if the vampire hunters get too jealous of each other's inventory items, whereupon they'll start pickpocketing one another until they're all angry enough to draw weapons. In some cases "good" characters will murder unarmed innocents simply because they've been blocked into a corner.

NPCs who are following you have a terrible tendency to get in your way during combat, which often results in your accidentally killing them. Which could result in other NPCs turning hostile on you, or failing a quest, if the outcome depends on a particular NPC's survival. Cue Cluster F-Bomb.

Start a fight with one NPC in the marketplace or resist arrest for picking up an apple. In a matter of seconds the whole market district will erupt into one giant gang war, with Citizens attacking guards, citizens attacking each other, and guards slaughtering citizens and each other left and right.

In the Caught in the Hunt dungeon, there's a pit that drops you onto a bed of spikes. If you survive, you can make your way back up into the same corridor. You can also trick enemies into chasing you and falling into this pit... and then doing it again... until they die.

After a certain point in the main quest, the members of the covert Mythic Dawn cult who assassinated the Emperor have low enough disposition to attack you on sight... in broad daylight, in a city, with dozens of guards around.

Sometimes if a guard ends up killing a citizen or someone else, that same guard will comment that since the body is warm, the killer must be nearby.

The aforementioned AI, while giving non-player characters a purpose besides pacing or standing in place, it can also hinder them in a number of ways. For example, NPCs that have a specific schedule set out for them will always try to fulfill it, and always walk back to their original location, even if there are benefits to gain elsewhere. Apparently, the citizens of Kvatch would rather live the rest of their days moping around their filthy makeshift tents at the doorstep of their destroyed, Daedra-infested city than accept any attempt by the player to be moved to a safer location with plentiful resources to thrive on. There are also many friendly NPCs that are found in hostile dungeons that are simply adamant about standing in a certain room and practically waiting to get themselves killed by the local bandits/undead/whatever.

This also happens to members of the Mythic Dawn who are killed in the mortal world. Rather than actually dying, their souls are transported to Mankar Camoran's realm of Paradise where they become immortal. Of course, once you destroy Paradise near the end of the main quest, then they all die for real.

At the end of Shivering Isles you become Sheogorath and eventually rule his realm of Oblivion. Though the transformation doesn't take it's full permanent form until you meet him in Skyrim.

Art Shift: Cyrodiil goes from "Romans in a Rain Forest" from the last games to rather normal middle age Europe (then back to Romans for Skyrim).

Also, due to the game's vibrant colors, Dunmer are suddenly not just gray-skinned, they are light blue-gray.

"I don't know who the Night Mother is, but she pays me to kill people! My own mother never loved me so much."

"What's with all this sneaking about? I'd much rather look my target in the eye and say something scary like, 'I am the deliverer of death!' and hit them with a hammer."

"Once, I had a contract to kill a little Nord girl at her birthday party. She asked me if I was the jester, so I replied: "No. I am a messenger of death". Ha! You should've seen the look on her face! She won't be reaching age six!"

If you refuse to help Glarthir, he takes matters into his own hands, and starts attacking people in the street with a battleaxe! Not only that, but if you try to convince him that no-one is spying on him, he'll convince himself that you're part of the conspiracy and attack you! Big mistake.

Most of the worshippers at Sheogorath's shrine.

Awesome but Impractical: The unicorn, which is supremely cool to ride around on but has such a high aggression that it will attack anyone it sees with drawn steel, including you.

Several leveled spells also count. Said spells are still fairly useful at lower levels even though they're weaker. When obtained at higher levels they become much stronger, but in turn they also cost so much magicka to use that they become extremely impractical.

This includes the summonable lich, which has an area of effect spell that can demolish the player character if an enemy gets too close.

The player, at the end "Knights of the Nine." You think that merely getting hit repeatedly with a magic sword and lightning bolts, then falling thousands of feet onto the ground, and being proclaimed dead by all his friends who personally saw his mangled body can keep the Divine Crusader down? Bah!

In Camoran's Paradise you'll probably notice that everyone there pops up again if you kill them. Created to be a paradise for his followers, there is no lasting death there. Of course, for many of them there is a sting there.

Most of the city guards around Cyrodiil are actually a really, really nice and friendly bunch of guys - but break any law, even by accidentally picking something up off a shopkeeper's table, and they'll immediately go nuts and kill you without hesitation. You can, however, yield to them by blocking long enough. The Guards actually do a pretty good job of keeping things running smoothly, an entire guild of professional thieves has a hard time operating in the imperial city as a result. (Not that it stops the Player and the Grey Fox from stealing an Elder Scroll right out from under their noses.)

The guards are so determined to hunt you down to face justice that there was even an account of one chasing you into an Oblivion gate. That is dedication!

Also, Umaril in Knights of the Nine, Jyggalag in Shivering Isles, Mannimarco in the Mages Guild questline, Ri'Zakar in the Fighters Guild questline, Hieronymus Lex for most of the Thieves Guild questline and Mathieu Bellamont in the Dark Brotherhood questline.

Bi the Way: Mirabelle Monet, a promiscuous innkeeper in Anvil, sleeps with each of her patrons on different nights of the week, including the one female tenant. However, the player can't rent a room from her, as she reserves her beds for seamen.

Bittersweet Ending: Mehrunes Dagon is defeated, but the Empire now has no heir. It's clear the Empire's not out of the woods yet and this will likely lead to an interesting future.

Black Eyes of Crazy: The more feral of the vampires, as well as the Dark Seducers featured in the Shivering Isles expansion pack. Subverted in the latter case: the Seducers are actually pretty nice.

Blade Below the Shoulder: In the Shivering Isles expansion, we have the Gatekeeper, a sizeable Frankenstein-like monster guarding the entrance to the Isles. One of his arms is a giant blade. After killing the monster, we are tasked later on with putting him back together, using various body parts. For his arm, we can choose between the exact same blade and also an axe and a mace. The cut content suggests that there was also a regular fist to be included too...

Sheogorath's classic line: "Wonderful, time for a celebration! Cheese for everyone!"

"Uuras the Shepherd sure takes care of his sheep. And boy, does he like cheese! I mean, he really likes cheese."

Blood-Stained Glass Windows: A sort of off-screen version occurs at the beginning of the "Knights Of The Nine" questline where the cathedral in Anvil is attacked and everyone inside is slaughtered. A bit more straight example would be Cadlew Chapel where the player is forced to fight necromancers who slaughtered everyone there to use as combat fodder. Really though, with all of the churches in the game, the player can invoke this dozens of times if they get bored and don't care where they pick a fight at.

Blown Across the Room: Sneak attacks with a bow can send enemies flying in a ludicrous ragdoll-ballet of death.

On a more mundane side, the final fate of Lucien Lachance. What's more disturbing than a skinless mutilated corpse? How about a very fresh one? Oh, and he's completely innocent of what they killed him for. (That may be the only thing he's innocent of.)

Erandur-Vangaril (a lich). He can only be found in a specific cave that none of the game's quests lead you to, and can only be fought there once your character reaches a certain level.

The giant slaughterfish, who shows up in one of the dungeons you explore in the Thieves Guild questline, but chances are you won't ever see this one if you don't fully explore the place.

There's also the Uderfrykte Matron at Dive Rock.

Booze-Based Buff: All over the place. Ale, mead, beer, wine... there are over a dozen alcoholic items for the player to drink, each with different stat buffs and debuffs. Probably the most interesting of these is Shadowbanish Wine, a special rare vintage that can only be found in a handful of forts. It grants the player a special ability when drunk, but its quest involves turning in six bottles to an innkeeper instead of actually drinking them. (There are more than enough to do the quest and have some left over, but because the wine is so hard to find many people don't bother once they reach the limit to turn in and get their reward.)

Actually, the chests in the forts where you find the Shadowbanish Wine will regenerate said item after a few in-game days have passed, so you can just keep going back again and again and pick up two bottles on each visit. Fort Grief is the easiest, as it's the only one where the chest with the wine is outside the fort.

Breaking and Bloodsucking: Once you've contracted vampirism, you can only feed on sleeping people. You can find bums sleeping around outside or you break in to homes and hope the psychic guards don't catch you with your fangs in a neck.

Bribing Your Way to Victory: quite a few of the DLCs are borderline cheat mods. (A quick and easy way of curing vampirism, a garden that supplies almost every rare ingredient, etc...)

Bring Help Back: You can do this by getting reinforcements from the other cities when Bruma is besieged by a Great Gate (but only after you close the gates threatening their cities, naturally). It's an optional quest, though, so you can just do it all yourself instead, if you prefer.

Bring It: Attempt to/Fight an ogre with your bare hands and it may make this gesture.

Bury Your Gays: There's one gay character in the game. You find this out shortly after you find his decaying corpse. Viranus Donton, the son of the Fighters Guild's grandmaster.

But for Me, It Was Tuesday: When Mogens Wind-Shifter killed Ra'Vindra, Mazoga the Orc swore to become a knight so she could avenge her friend. Mogens doesn't remember any of this when you and Mazoga kill him.

But Thou Must: One quest in Anvil involves investigating a series of robberies for the town watch. A group of women have been luring men to a remote cabin with promises of a good time, only to take all their possessions once the men have removed their gear. If you go to a local inn soon afterwards, you will meet the women. If the player character is male, they will attempt to lure him to the cabin with the aforementioned promises. If the PC is female, however, they will offer her a place in their gang. That evening, the quest calls for you to join them at the cabin. No matter whether the PC is male or female, your only dialogue options involve revealing your status as a mole, then taking out the whole gang by yourself in combat. As a female character (who may even be a member of the Thieves Guild and/or Dark Brotherhood and whose railroaded behavior therefore makes little sense), this seems like a waste of a good plot.

An even worse example comes in the final stages of the Dark Brotherhood missions, after becoming a Silencer. Your orders are delivered to you via dead drops, giving your the location and name of your target(s). After the first two, there's a noticable change in the sound of the writing, from Lucien's professional but polite tone to outright glee and creepy familiarity. Also, the orders start giving the player explanations of the targets' "crimes" and details of personal lives, things that Lucien had never done prior unless it had relevance in the mission (ie, a hit was placed on a necromancer who he was trying to become a lich, making conventional killing methods difficult). But the worst parts? There's a massively obvious change in the handwriting of the orders, and you can even find Dark Brotherhood robes in the possession of your newest 'targets.' It'd be one thing for the game to put evidence in front of you and let you act on it, but you have no choice but to carry out six of these clearly forged orders before being confronted by Lucien and having already served as an accessory to the conspiracy that would get him killed.

There's quite a lot of this in the game. Other examples feature a prank that Volanaro wants you to play on Jeanne Frasoric, the head of the Bruma Mages Guild, where the game doesn't give you the option to tell Jeanne about the prank; and a mission that the Blackwood Company undertakes to slaughter goblins where the goblins are actually innocent humans and there's no way to stop them from being cut down in their own home once the quest begins, whether you figure out what's going on or not.

Chekhov's Skill: J'skar, the lovable Khajiit prankster of the Bruma Mages Guildhall, is shown to only be really good at invisibility. When Mannimarco attacks Bruma's guildhall, his invisibility mastery is what makes him the sole survivor.

Or maybe not. His comments after you kill the necromancer looking for him sound like Mannimarco let him live to send a message to the rest of the guild.

Clever Crows: This game features Corvus Umbranox, the Grey Fox, leader of the Thieves Guild, and former Count of Anvil. Fellow gets around. He's clever and dark-haired.

Code Name: All of the brigands aboard "The Bloated Float" inn-boat during the quest "An Unexpected Voyage".

Continuity Nod: The "Hero of Daggerfall" and Jagar Tharn are mentioned in passing many times, in both in-game books and by a few certain characters. The province of Morrowind has abolished slavery (according to NPC chatter). These examples are notable because most content in Oblivion is self-contained (though this is by no means an exhaustive list).

Also, the Utherfrykte Matron. The Utherfrykte was an obscure Bonus Boss in the "Bloodmoon" expansion for Morrowind. In relation to this is an NPC from Bloodmoon, the foxy Svenja Snow-Song, who became your character's second in command at the Solstheim Mead Hall. In Oblivion, you can find her husband's journal at Dive Rock, detailing numerous nightmares she had regarding the creatures. Having enough of it, the two decided to venture to Cyrodiil to slay their Matron, only for Svenja to get eaten alive by the creature before getting off a shot. Her husband watches in horror, and is mortally wounded soon after, being able to make it back to their nearby camp to finish writing. You can find the husband's body and journal at the camp, and can also slay the Matron once and for all. Inside its body is Svenja's bow... along with her mostly digested corpse.

One off hand but memorable downer instance of this is an NPC in the Imperial Capital who was at Raven's Rock, the ebony mining settlement from Morrowind's expansion. He left when the money dried up, meaning that the settlement canonically fails, though not entirely, as it's still (barely) populated by the time the events of Dragonborn roll around.

A snippet of info you get from a random loading screen says "No one has escaped from the Imperial Prison in over 40 years, since the days of Jagar Tharn and the Imperial Simulacrum". The Eternal Champion escaped from the Imperial Prison during the late Imperial Simulacrum, just under 40 years ago.

Another couple of Morrowind examples: You can overhear two Elven NPCs talking about the Nerevarine having left on an expedition to Akavir. You can also over hear mention of "St. Jiub, who drove all the cliff racers from Morrowind."

Convection Schmonvection: Possibly deliberately done. The areas of Oblivion you go to seem to be small islands in an ocean of lava, yet one NPC points out that while he'd expect it to be hot, all he feels is a deathly chill.

Cosmic Retcon/Hand Wave/A Wizard Did It: Behold the kingdom of the Red King once jungled! Apparently, a god (or the White-Gold Tower, or the Emperor, or the Emperor using the White-Gold Tower, because canon and lore are confusing) decided that Cyrodiil should be a deciduous forest rather than a rainforest like in previous installments of the series.

And that Uriel Septim should have a head of long, flowing silver hair, rather than the perfectly smooth and hairless scalp he sported in Daggerfall (Ironically looking more like Patrick Stewart than the version he played.) However, at least he has the possible justification he lost his hair due to the stress of the time and later regrew it.

Not to forget, Ocato, who also sported a smooth scalp and a badass posture in Daggerfall, suddenly turned into an Altmer in Oblivion.

It is implied that the dungeon in Oblivion is supposed to be the same one as in Arena. Both games take place in sewers underneath the palace (Though in Oblivion it's only the very last area) not counting the one zombie in Oblivion and the "Random Thieves" in Arena. All the enemies are rats and goblins. And the mentioned thieves only appear if you stand in one place too long, where do they come from? They come out of hidden doors in the walls, which the Mythic Dawn used when assassinating the Emperor.

If you attack Sheogorath at any time during Shivering Isles, he will paralyse you with magic, then teleport you to thousands of feet above ground out in the wilderness and let gravity do the work for him.

Transformation into Worm Thrall, the fate of The Mole within the Necromancers, Mucianus Allias. You are expected (but not required) to Mercy Kill them.

The many corpses seen strung up in the realm of Oblivion, along with the sacks of skin simply labelled "The Punished" have their fates left to the player's imagination, but they were no doubt very painful deaths.

Near the end of The Dark Brotherhood Questline, Lucien Lachance is cornered by members of the Black Hand and killed for his treachery... except he didn't do it. All that's left of him is a strung up husk, with its mouth ripped out. If you talk to one of the culprits, she will mention eating his intestines.

Cruelty Is the Only Option: In the Mehrunes' Razor DLC, the "normal" way to finish the final puzzle and get the Razor is by eating a still living man's heart, getting you a massive infamy penalty. The only others options are to either force the gate (which requires a near maxed out strength stat), or fight That One Boss.

Alternately, you can take the heart, not eat it, and try to force the gate. This will weaken the aforementioned boss significantly without the negative effects of eating the heart, which include contracting Porphyric Hemophilia (the disease that turns you into a vampire) and Cannibal's Prion. Additionally, if you keep the heart, you can make a potion that turns you into a vampire with maxed Alchemy.

Crystal Dragon Jesus: Oddly enough, the Nine Divines, considering how previous games depicted the religion (particularly in Daggerfall) as very polytheistic Greco-Roman religion.

This was also hit the hardest with the Nibenese-Cyrodiil (The Imperials who live in the east), in a very bizarre form of cultural Flanderization. Previously, the Nibenese where described as an esoteric and philosophizing, with elaborate customs and devote to various religions, cults, and ancestor worship. By the time of Oblivion though, they were described as simply chapel-going and doing religious services on Sundays, complementing the now christianity-based worshipping of Nine Divines.

Culture Chop Suey: Oblivion is set in a predominantly European Fantasy Counterpart Culture. However, Cloud Ruler Temple is a Buddhist temple outside, complete with upturned roof corners. Inside, we're back in fantasy Europe. This is pointed out and explained in game: at one time, the empire was ruled by a series of Akaviri (Fantasy Counterpart Culture of Japan) stewards after a failed invasion on their part (long story). The Blades were formed, and Cloud Ruler Temple built, during this time, hence the Akaviri influences on their armor, weapons and architecture.

Darkest Hour: Once you're far enough into the main quest, not only to members of the Mythic Dawn start openly attacking people in the city streets, but Oblivion Gates open right outside each major city.

Prophet: Well then, "Hail, Hero of Kvatch!" Let me add one more voice to the neverending chorus of praise. I'm sure one of your many devotees will able to guide you on your way to find the Crusader's Relics.

This lovely dialogue option sadly does not appear due to a bug (but there are bugfix mods for the PC, thank goodness):

Disc One Nuke: One of the common complaints is that level scaling produces a lack of these (and Beef Gate), though some can still be found. OOO, as a result of removing level scaling, has many more, particularly if you understand the lock picking minigame enough to open very hard chests and steal them.

It's relatively minor, but in the tutorial dungeon, after Blades Captain Renault is killed by some Mythic Dawn assassins, you can loot her body for her personal sword, a steel Akaviri katana. While by no means an incredibly impressive weapon, it's still an extremely good weapon for a level one character and can make mincemeat out of pretty much all the enemies in the dungeon, and could serve you well for the first few levels (and is also better than the other weapon she was holding, a steel short sword). Except that after the Emperor's death, when you talk to Baurus, he will thank you for keeping the sword and take it from you so it can be returned to Cloud Ruler Temple. And no, you can't just drop it before Baurus talks to you, because once the conversation is over, the sword simply disappears, meaning there really is no way to hold onto it.

Doomed Hometown: Martin's hometown of Kvatch is destroyed by Daedra at the beginning of the main quest. Unusual because it's not the player character with the Doomed Hometown.

Do Not Taunt Cthulhu: Thieves love to attempt to steal things from Nocturnal, the daedric goddess of the night (and therefore, a crucial part of their jobs), Two thieves succeed, and the player recovers the artifact, the Grey Fox exists because of this, and one in a book has a fate that's not elaborated on when she gets caught past being consumed by an angry Nocturnal's shadows.

Dude, Where's My Respect?: Even if you're already the Champion of Cyrodiil, the guilds will still make you do petty tasks before they let you advance. And highwaymen will still try to rob you. And nearly every boss-type character you defeat will use his last words to tell you what an unworthy opponent you are.

It's even worse when you've beaten the Shivering Isles and become the new Sheogorath. Everyone and their mother still treats you the same in Cyrodiil and in Oblivion, including certain types who should know what you are now. Mankar Camoran especially should know, and if not him, certainly the Dremora. However, this would have required much more extra dialog recording and time to implement and would have heavily altered much of the game as a result, which no doubt would have pushed the expansion beyond the deadline.

Voranil. In the words of the UESP Wiki: He throws the best parties every weekend, and anybody who's anybody in the city goes there. Unfortunately, that doesn't include you, and it never will. It doesn't matter if you're the Grand Champion of the Arena, the Arch-Mage of the Mages Guild, and head of every other faction in the game. It doesn't matter if you own the nicest, most beautifully-furnished house in the city, or in Cyrodiil for that matter.

Dummied Out: The Lock spell, mainly so as to not break NPC's scripts and such.

A city, Sutch, appeared in early versions of the game's map, but does not appear in the actual game. Fort Sutch, the unmarked "Attack on Fort Sutch" quest, and a handful of leftover text are all that remain of it in the released game. It would have been located just north-west of Kvatch, and likely would have contained the Chapel of Kynareth, which is also absent in the game.

But as with much anything, there's a mod that adds Sutch into the game as it was originally planned.

Dungeon Bypass: In many forts and Ayleid ruins, the final door, after the boss mob and reward chest, leads to a ledge overlooking the entrance, so that you can jump down and leave immediately rather than have to backtrack through an empty dungeon. With sufficient Acrobatics skill (it can be fortified over 200 if necessary), you can jump up to the ledge and work backwards, surprising the boss from behind, and immediately claiming the most lucrative loot.

A different but significantly easier one is at Fort Farragut, a.k.a. where Lucien Lachance makes his hideout. Don't want to hack through all those skeletons? Just go to the big, hollow tree on the northeastern side of the fort to drop straight down on top of Lucien himself.

Dysfunction Junction: Most aren't given any background story, but several character's pasts are implied to be this. Most notably with members of the Dark Brotherhood (which is fitting because it explains how they became psychopaths to begin with).

Skingrad. The blacksmith's an alcoholic, the town trader's in a loveless common-law marriage with his maid, one alchemist's a necrophiliac, the other hasn't been outside for years, and there's a paranoid wood elf convinced that half the city's population is trying to kill him. Then there's the Count and his right-hand man... Yet despite everything, Skingrad is noted as being one of the most prosperous counties in Cyrodiil.

Element Number Five: An alchemist in Shivering Isles theorizes that each of the four classical elements corresponds to a part of the body (fire is meat, earth is bone, water is blood and air is breath), and that these elements when brought together, along with the fifth: light, create the sixth element, Flesh.

Emo: Dementia blacksmith Cutter from Shivering Isles almost plays this straight. She's halfway between emo and psycho, with serious self-esteem issues and a self-cutting habit, but she also seems to like wounding others and tests all her weapons "personally". There's always fresh blood on her work floor.

Empty Levels: Leveling up in a manner that is remotely intuitive - say, by choosing your main skills as those you expect to use often and leveling up when you have the option on the assumption that gaining a level will make you stronger - will result in a character's abilities increasing minutely while the enemies around you transform from annoyances to nightmares. Many people just bypass the whole aggravating "leveling up" process by never sleeping.

End of an Age: The end of the Cyrodillic Empire to be exact. The Septim bloodline is gone and the empire itself in a weakened state. NPCs in the game already talk about the High Elves planning to go against the empire and, after finishing the main quest, some of the provinces plan on seceding. Turns out that in Skyrim, the High Elves formed their own Empire, slowly picking away territory. And, like the NPC's said, 2 of the other provinces did indeed secede. By the time Skyrim's story starts, the Empire is only a shadow of its former self.

Escort Mission: A few, but by far the most annoying one is the quest The Wayward Knight. Farwil Indarys, your escortee and complete Leeroy, will run into battle against enemies far stronger than he, and even worse will completely ignore environmental dangers. He'll even follow enemies off cliffs!

The higher your level, the worse these become, to the point of Fake Difficulty. While monsters will level, and even get replaced by classes of newer and more powerful monsters, the people you escort... don't.

Even Evil Has Standards: The Dark Brotherhood might kill almost anyone, but even they seem to draw the line at the thought of killing the Emperor himself... though this might be because his death is actually quite bad as far as keeping the barriers to Oblivion in place.

Justified due to the fact that he's the Gray Fox and the curse of the cowl he wears strikes the wearer's identity from history. In fact he even tells you his name a few times but thanks to the curse you still only know him as a stranger.

The Adoring Fan.

The player character is referred to in various ways, usually related to their prior accomplishments (Grand Champion of the Arena, Hero of Kvatch, Champion of Cyrodiil, etc.). When fighting in the Arena proper, they are allowed to select a nickname, though.

Everyone Is Bi: Dementia blacksmith Cutter will become a bit flirty with your character upon becoming Sheogorath, regardless of gender.

Everything Fades: Without mods or using console cheats, as long as you don't leave the area corpses never disappear; even if you do leave, it takes three in-game days for the cell to reset. Can be rather troublesome since the developers didn't give the ability to remove corpses like they did in Morrowind.

Evil Counterpart: The Order of the Black Worm, to Necromancy in general. The Blackwood Company is essentially what the Fighters Guild would be like if they didn't have a shred of morality or decency.

Evil Is Sterile: In the Shivering Isles expansion, the amazingly creepy Knights of Order and their master Jyggalag are said to have no original thoughts whatsoever. Their fighting style reflects this - Jyggalag uses some spells, but the knights just swing swords at you until you or they die.

Evil Weapon: Dawn/Duskfang, which grows in power for every 12 enemies it kills, although this has to be done every day and night and only affects it after dawn or dusk, hence the name.

This weapon is actually four weapons in one, two of which are upgraded or "superior" versions of the "base weapons" (Dawnfang and Duskfang). The sword "morphs" into a form appropriate for the current time of day, and if you've slaughtered enough enemies before that point, it will morph into the superior version of its counterpart. For example, Dawnfang will morph into Superior Duskfang at night.

Face-Heel Turn: As the plot of Shivering Isles progresses, several citizens defect to the Forces of Order, including one of the two Dukes of Madness. Schrödinger's Gun: You implicitly pick which duke or duchess defects. Whether you assassinate the Duke of Mania or the Duchess of Dementia, the other, surviving ruler will defect.

Faceless Goons: Dremora, Aurorans, and Knights of Order tend to wear face-concealing helmets.

Fake Ultimate Hero: Raynil Dralas, who killed his old adventuring partners for a magical amulet and covered it up by planting evidence suggesting they were vampires.

False Innocence Trick: In one quest you can buy a house, only to find that it's haunted. Investigation reveals the corpse of a lich (imprisoned for being evil) who claims he's turned good after having time to reflect on his crimes. Unfortunately Stupidity Is the Only Option if you want to complete the quest.

Fame Gate: The Heaven Stones, which can only be activated and grant you their Greater Powers after the sum of your Fame and Infamy reaches a certain value. Also, the Knight of the Nine expansion has an inversion; it requires your character to be free of any infamy, which means (unless you've been an absolute saint for the whole game) you have to go on a pilgrimage to every single shrine in the game to receive a blessing.

Fan Disservice: The Goblin Shamans show way too much veiny cleavage than is necessary.

Fantastic Racism: There actually isn't too much of this in Cyrodiil; it's a very racially diverse place and most folks are very accepting. Although you do get the occasional negative comment directed towards your character's race. The bottom of this page shows that character's base disposition towards you is partly based upon what race you play. Everyone hates the poor Dunmer and the poor Orcs.

One minor NPC has a hobby of fostering discord between Argonians and Khajit. If you talk to him and you happen to belong to one of those two races, he'll tell you a member of the other race insulted you behind your back.

Interesting variation in the quest Whodunit, where you're locked in a mansion with five people of various races you have to kill them, including a Breton, a Nord, a Redguard, a Dark Elf, and an Imperial. The Breton is racist against the Dark Elf, but the most extreme racism is displayed by the Redguard towards the Nord; which is to say that the worst hatred isn't between the fantasy races, but between the humans.

The town of Leyawiin is actually quite racist between the Khajits and Argonians, who will actually tell racist jokes about each other. This makes sense, since the town lies directly between the borders of the respective races' homelands.

The first character you meet in the game, Valen Dreth, has a different set of insults for you depending on the race you've chosen.

In other words he's basically racist against everyone. So it's probably not surprising that someone put a hit on him.

Even if you're a dark elf like him, he either promises to sleep with your wife (if you're male) or propositions you (if you're female). So the racism probably comes from just being a Jerkass.

The dev team actually programmed racism into the engine; every character has a setting for how much they like or dislike characters of a certain race. This doesn't normally appear in the game because the settings on most characters are insanely high. The mod Race Balancing Project actually tinkers with these settings, to make races that don't like each other act more snarky towards each other than the defaults.

Their Proud Warrior Race status and physical appearance were probably original inspired by the Masai, but the way their culture interacts with the Empire resembles the Sikhs' relationship with 19th-century imperial Britain.

They have a bit of moors in them too. On that note, we haven't seen much of the Khajiit homeland but lore suggests they lead a tribal lifestyle similar to aborigines and pygmy peoples.

Given the racism towards them, a tribal culture, a religion that differs from the Imperial norms more than a lot of others, an addiction to a liquid substance and a reputation for being thieves, one could also say they're fantasy Native-Americans (the theft part being casinos).

The Imperials are mostly based on Romans (They have an Emperor, their armies are organised into Legions, their capital has a gladiator arena etc.).

Cyrodiil itself is primarily medieval Europe, owing a lot to Arthurian legend. The Empire and the Imperial Legion mix together the ancient Roman Empire with kings and knights. Asian influences exist thanks to the Akaviri. However, many of the towns and cities better resemble the Americas from the early colonial period to the 1800s, with cobblestone paved streets and raised sidewalks. Clothing also heavily mixes ancient and modern styles, from medieval clothing to things that may have been worn in the 1700s.

Fate Worse Than Death: Relmyna's experiments, whom she kills over and over to get her methods just right. She does bring "the worthy ones" back to life for good at the end, but how traumatized must they be?

Camoran's Paradise, where his followers are killed by daedra, reborn, and killed again.

Fetch Quest: there aren't too many of these, thankfully. However, the Cheydinhal Mages' Guild quest is rather an egregious example: you are sent to retrieve something from a well just outside the building. When you return, less than a minute later, you are informed that a heated argument took place and the guild leader abandoned his post. (It Makes Sense in Context, though.)

Flat Earth Atheist: Zigzagged with Else God-Hater in Skingrad. Her involvement with the Mythic Dawn might make this seem like a subversion, but she does mention that she has no trouble believing the Daedric Princes exist, on the grounds that "they do things. Bad things, mostly, but things you can see." Yet she isn't convinced by the actions of the Nine Divines despite the consistent and measurable magical effects caused by praying at altars.

See that smaller tower right next to you? It wants to kill you too. And it doesn't care if it sees you.

Foreshadowing: Some people will talk about unrest in Summerset about an Aldmeri uprising. Skyrim expands on this with the Aldmeri Dominion.

Don't forget Umbacano, who was going to gain the power of an ancient Ayleid king, solely to restore his own kind to power and subjugate everyone else... all while getting you to do all the hard work for him! It was already hinted at pretty strongly that a few Altmer wanted the old ways back.

There is a piece of rather heavy foreshadowing that is possible to miss during the Dark Brotherhood Questline. If you unlock a barrel in J'Ghasta's house, you will find a set of Black Hand robes and a copy of The Five Tenets. This is an early indicator that you are being set up to kill the members of the Black Hand.

Forest Ranger: The Imperial Legion has rangers roaming through the woods. Also, apparently the Bosmer are really good at this sorta thing.

Forged Letter: In the Thieves Guild questline, the you are tasked to forge a letter of recommendation, in order to get rid of the troublesome Watch Captain.

Free-Love Future: The Khajiit bandits, the Renrijra Krin, want this kind of future.

"Life is short. If you have not made love recently, please, put down this book, and take care of that with all haste. Find a wanton lass or a frisky lad, or several, in whatever combination your wise loins direct, and do not under any circumstances play hard to get. Our struggle against the colossal forces of oppression can wait. "Good. Welcome back."

Freudian Excuse: Bellamont, the assassin who betrays the Dark Brotherhood has one in the form of his dead mother. It's a bit more justified than most Freudian excuses simply because it was, in fact, the Dark Brotherhood who killed his mother.

Game Mod: Enough of them to build several whole new games. In fact, several mods are there for just that purpose. Sadly, Sturgeon's Law is in effect for many of them.

Some of the more renowned mods include Oscuro's Oblivion Overhaul (removes leveled enemies in favor of hand placed, as well as other tweaks), Deadly Reflex (A complex combat overhaul), Martigan's Monster Mod (adds literally hundreds of new monsters, many of which are hand made) and The Lost Spires (lengthy quest mod with a complex story about the ancient history of Tamriel).

Oblivion XP replaces the skill leveling system with more traditional experience points (earned by killing monsters, completing quests, discovering locations, etc), and eliminates increasing attributes based on skills in favor of simply allocating points at every level however the player sees fit.

The most recent major mod is Knights Of The Nine: Revelation, which serves as a sequel to the original KOTN, building heavily on more. You will eventually be sent back to the first era to assist in the fall of White Gold Tower, meeting St. Allesia and Pelinal Whitestrake. And, if just to add more fuel to the guessing, you get to chat with the severed head of Pelinal Whitestrake... as if Sheogorath's "a severed head" line in Skyrim didn't need even more fuel to confuse matters...

Don't forget Kvatch Rebuilt, which sees the burnt town restored and, well, rebuilt. Trade And Commerce lets the player own a shop to sell goods through rather than having to sell everything to stores. Then there are mods which completely rewrite lore, such as A Path Of Dawn which lets the player join the Mythic Dawn, and many, many mods which expand on the Dark Brotherhood. Player homes, armor display mannequins, weapons and armor and even tweaks to the crime system, merchant system... beautification mods, mods to make the game run better on lower-end systems, level uncappers... if you can ask for it, there's a good chance a mod exists for it.

Morroblivion which successfully converted the entire Morrowind game to the Oblivion. They've just started Skywind which will again update Morrowind to Skyrim.

Integration: The Stranded Light, a sprawling quest mod larger than all the DLCs combined, involving helping guild full of friendly (and not so friendly) daedra, Khajiit sufferage, stamping out (or aiding) the notorious Renrijra Krin, building a mushroom city, and a romance with a daedra seducer, just to scratch the very surface.

Game Over: If the timer runs out on the giant daedric siege machine bearing down on Bruma, the game just has you reload. This is unusual, as most events like this in a Bethesda game would allow Bruma to be destroyed, like how you can destroy Megaton in Fallout 3.

Gate Guardian: The Gatekeeper in the expansion The Shivering Isles is a giant monster created by Relmyna Verenim out of the flesh of the dead to guard the exit from the Fringe out into the rest of the Shivering Isles. The player kills it to gain access to the rest of the realm, but is later tasked by Sheogorath to create a new Gatekeeper with Relmyna's help.

Genre Savvy: During "An Unexpected Voyage", if you convince Selene that you know a lot about her operation and tell her that you killed her compatriots, she'll see that she's outmatched and surrender peacefully.

Get Into Jail Free: A sidequest involves getting yourself imprisoned to gain the trust of an inmate, who you are told has hidden a stash of treasure somewhere.

The Knights of the Nine expansion also adds Aurorans, humanoid Daedra associated with Meridia, that wear golden armor and feature the same hulking body structure as the Xivilai. They act as Umaril's personal army of Smash Mooks, and wield Ayleid Battle-Axes in combat.

Hero Antagonist: Naturally, there are a few of these in the Thieves Guild and Dark Brotherhood quest lines.

Heroic Bastard: Martin is the bastard son of dear old Emperor Uriel, which is the reason why the assassins weren't as quick to get to him, so you had time to save his life. Yet despite the fact that almost nobody knew of his existence until now (even he wasn't aware that he was the Emperor's son until you told him), when everyone finds out they immediately kneel before him and treat him with total respect as their Emperor.

It probably helps that all the other candidates are dead, and without an Emperor on the throne the world is (literally) going to hell.

Heroic Sacrifice: Hannibal Traven commits suicide by trapping his own soul inside of the colossal black soul gem, so the player can defeat the King of Worms.

He Who Fights Monsters: There's actually nothing stopping you from going out and killing everyone that can be killed, leaving Cyrodill a desolate wasteland populated by a handful of people before Mehrunes Dagon is even mentioned.

Honey Trap: Like their mythological namesake, the Sirens in Anvil use one. They rob men by flirting with them, getting them to come out to a farmhouse in the middle of the night and take their clothes off, and taking everything they have while they're defenseless.

The Horde: Mehrunes Dagon's army of Daedra during the assaults on Bruma and the Imperial City.

100% Heroism Rating: You have to settle for the occasional compliment ("You're the one who closed the demon gate! The Hero of Kvatch!"). Although you get these based on your actions regardless of your fame or infamy. NPCs' disposition towards you also increases as your fame rating increases.

Oh, and you do get a statue of your character built (it's essentially a copy of your character model at the time the quest was completed but stone textured).

Which is modeled with the most valuable items you have with you when you do this. There is a very nice and thus valuable dagger you get from the Brotherhood, which will take precedence. It just looks silly - full regalia, big armour, giant shield, ramming a 3 inch dagger into the sky...

Although, apparently, if you have enough torches in your inventory at the time of completion, your weapon will be on fire!

Oblivion tracks fame and infamy separately so you can be greeted heartily when you approach a guard and then be chastised for being a thief when you talk to him.

Hungry Weapon: the warrior Umbra holes up in an Ayleid ruin mostly to isolate her sword (also called Umbra) from the souls it lusts for. Of course, you, the bastard that you are, will kill her and take this evil thing for yourself.

Hyperspace Arsenal: While you're not able to carry an infinite amount of stuff, you can pack several hundred pounds worth of stuff into an invisible pocket. Each item has a weight value, and based on your Strength stat, you can carry so much stuff (1 point of Strength = 5 pounds of encumbrance). Warriors who raise strength can carry more things (up to 500 pounds with a max 100 strength), and spells/effects such as Feather exist to lighten your load even further. Also, being highly skilled(Expert or Master rank) in either of the Light or Heavy armor attributes decreases the weight of armor you have equipped- at Master skill rank, heavy type armor will weigh nothing when worn. It's possible to actually have more items in your inventory than you can carry, but you will not be able to move, and negative effects such as Burden or Drain/Damage Strength can lower encumbrance. The only visible items in your total inventory are whatever you have equipped at the time.

But this largely seems to affect the player only. NPCs usually only carry a limited stock of goods and rarely pick up anything, and even Burden spells are rarely effective to keep them in place.

This is taken to extremes due to a bug that effects the Duelists in the Shivering Isles. Each one carries up to several thousand copies of their weapon in inventory with no ill effects, though trying to take all those weapons for yourself (pickpocketing/character death) can either leave you over-encumbered, or glitch the game severely. The Unofficial Patch fixes this.

Idle Animation: If your character is equipped with a one-handed weapon and is standing still, on rare occasion you can see him/her reach for the weapon and check if it's properly attached to their waist.

Ignored Confession: During a Dark Brotherhood quest where you are required to kill 5 people in a Closed Circle ala Agatha Christie, you can straight up tell the person who greets you that you are an assassin, sent to kill everyone. She'll laugh, praise your sense of humour, and her disposition will rocket to full.

If You're So Evil, Eat This Kitten: The final step to being initiated into the Mythic Dawn is to murder a prisoner as as sacrifice to Mehrunes Dagon. If you try to infiltrate them, you'll be presented with an Argonian they've captured. It's up to you if you want to save him and blow your cover, or kill him to keep the ruse.

I Know You Know I Know: Both the Paranoia quest in Skingrad and being the Duchess of Dementia's "Grand Inquisitor" in the Shivering Isles.

Impossible Thief: The Dark Brotherhood agent that asks if you want to join will always appear when you rest, even if this rest will take you into a dream world that needs a special amulet to enter.

If you're in the Shivering Isles, an entire alternate plane of Oblivon, he'll appear, smile, and say "I HAVE NO GREETING." Good luck joining if you're not on the PC and therefore can't force the quest to advance.

Impossibly Mundane Explanation: Those mysterious ruins all over the Shivering Isles? They're not, as you'd expect, the ruins of some mysterious vanished civilization; they're the previous versions of New Sheoth. Sheogorath builds New Sheoth in a different spot after every Greymarch because he always forgets where the last site was.

Indestructible Edible: Many of the places you visit, from caves to ancient dungeons that have been abandoned for hundreds of years, will have perfectly edible food stashed away in containers. Then again, this is a world that seems to lack any stort of refridgeration or food preservation yet all foods you find will be perfectly fresh, even stuff found on the floor.

Infinity–1 Sword: Umbra. Not quite as spectacular as the Plus Ones, but is the best one-handed weapon in terms of damage and can Soul Trap, and you can get it even if you're fresh out of the tutorial... of course, killing Umbra to get her sword and gear will be nigh impossible unless you're well prepared.

The main quest contains many claims the empire is in chaos with the Emperor's assassination. The game fails to show any actual chaos outside of Kvatch. Although it is mentioned that other cities throughout Tamriel are being invaded by the Daedra, or other events like distant battles involving Nords and Orcs, or groups of wizards causing trouble in Summerset Isle, you don't get to see too much of the former and none of the latter two, since the game's boundaries confine you to Cyrodiil.

An advertisement for the Red Diamond says it has the best guards, but it in fact has no guards. In fact, it's one of the easiest and most profitable places to rob, as it's the only store with inventory of any value that respawns (due to being in containers that are easily opened with the easily stolen key).

I Owe You My Life: Seed-Neeus and Dar-Ma, the General Trader in Chorrol and her daughter, respectively, both say this after you save Dar-Ma from the Lovecraft-esque townof Hackdirt. It even comes with maxed out disposition in both women, some free Merchantile training from Seed-Neeus, and Dar-Ma will occasionally welcome you with "My hero!" if you talk to her afterwards.

Ironic Echo: "You're going to die in here!" and "All of Tamriel will know my name"elaborate when you first start the game, the first NPC you meet is a Dunmer named Valen Dreth, a prisoner in the cell opposite yours. He'll insult you (depending on which race and gender you choose, even if you're a Dunmer yourself), and then finish with "you're going to die in here". Additionally, before you find him the 2nd time, he is heard taunting a guard that "All of Tamriel will know my name" when he is released, his killing winds up a major headline. If you're in the Dark Brotherhood, you're given a contract to kill him. You don't have to talk to him, but if you do, you can fling those exact words back at him before murdering him.

It is revealed that Gaiden Shinji, whose "The best techniques are passed down by the survivors." quote started Arena, was not a survivor. People still think he's amazing though.

During A Shadow Over Hackdirt, the villagers plan to sacrifice Seed-Neeus' daughter, Dar-Ma, an Argonian. Given the story that inspired the quest, and the fact that the Argonians are a mix between Lizard Folk and Fish People, someone on the writing team had a sense of humour.

Valen Dreth, the prisoner in the Imperial dungeons you meet in the prologue. No matter what race or gender you are, Dreth will mock and insult you and assure you're going to end your days in prison. When you return to the prison, he can also be heard hurling ineffectual insults at the guards.

Glenroy the Blade, also met in the prologue. He's very distrustful and rude of the player and at one point suggests killing you just in case you are working with the assassins.

Alval Uvani, who brushes off every attempt to speak with him by saying: "I have no time for your pathetic attempts at small talk. Now walk away, before I get nasty!"

The entire skooma-dealing Orum gang in Cheydinhal save for Borba.

M'raaj-Dar, the Khajiit merchant in the Cheydinhal Dark Brotherhood sanctuary is extremely rude and hostile torwards the player... but he apologizes torwards you just in time for the mission that demands that you kill him.

Mazoga the Orc, at least when you first meet her. She takes an exceptionally rude and peremptory manner with you and Weebam-Na, and insists that you address her with her self-given style of "Sir Mazoga".

The Yellow Team Champion from the Arena, who seems to delight in coming up with a new insult everytime you advance in rank. Later, she seems determined to be the one to personally kill you.

Joke Item: Lord Rugdumph's sword. First off, it's designed like a claymore and is used as a two-handed weapon, yet both its length and stats are more fit for a longsword. Additionally, it's statistically no better than an average silver longsword, which you are able to find as early as 4th level, or even 1st if you manage to take it from a guard's inventory. The enchantments aren't of much use either: Absorb Speechcraft 5 points for 5 seconds is completely worthless (it's highly unlikely you'd be able to first attack someone to absorb their Speechcraft and then start a conversation with someone else before the effect wears off, and even then, 5 points makes no notable difference whatsoever), and while Silence for 5 seconds could be potentially useful against mages, the duration is so short that you'd have to continuously hit them with this sword until they die, at which point you'd probably waste a considerable amount of the remaining charges of the enchantment. However, the joke item status seems justified, considering who gives it to you...

Keywords Conversation: Dialogue is fully voiced, so the keywords appear in the list after they are spoken. NPCs can refuse to react to certain keywords if your Relationship Values aren't high enough, however.

Kill 'em All: There are lots of scripted NPC deaths in the game. Let's leave it at that.

Played straight in the Who Dun It quest.

Kleptomaniac Hero: Optional for the player, but not profitable unless you either a.) join the Thieves Guild, b) have the Thieves' Den DLC installed and have bought yourself the fence at Dunbarrow Cove, or c.) use stolen ingredients to manufacture potions.

In-Game Novel: Tons. Most of them aren't full length novels, but some are.

In-Universe Game Clock: Defaults to "one ingame hour is equivalent to two real life minutes". Can be changed with console commands in PC version.

Irrelevant Importance: Once you get your hands on them, quest items are eternally stuck in your inventory. The game will never ever let you dump quest items. Even if they've already served their purpose and the said quest has been completed.

But considering that quest items typically have a weight value of 0, it's not really a big deal anyway

This isn't always true. Most quest items have their quest flag turned off (allowing them to be dropped and also giving them weight) when they are no longer vital to their relevant quest, but occasionally the scripting isn't set properly. One or two items that aren't ever vital to a quest are incorrectly set with the flag, making them undroppable and weightless as soon as they're given.

Imperial Guards. You know you're a ham when upon seeing someone swipe a grape, you shout, "Stop right there, criminal scum!"

The Arena announcer is made of this trope, although in his line of work it's sort of expected.

The male Dremora, in addition to being fierce warriors, are exceptionally hammy when it comes to their various battle-cries. It certainly helps that they're voiced by the same actor as the Imperial males. Averted with the rare female Dremora, which due to an oversight in the game's development, arecompletelysilent. Unsurprisingly, all of the above, except the Nords and Orcs, are voiced by the same actor, Wes Johnson.

Late to the Tragedy: When the player arrives at Kvatch and finds the city completely destroyed. And when the player arrives at the Bruma Mage's guildhall and finds almost everyone murdered and the place in ruins.

Leeroy Jenkins: Pretty much every NPC in the game, but most notably the one in the Mages' Guild quest who tells you to follow him and runs straight into a deathtrap not 30 seconds after meeting.

There's also the son of the Count of Cheydinhal, who blindly ran into an Oblivion gate and got most of his men killed.

The Bruma Guard in the Main Quest are guilty of this. Why can’t you LIVE? Burd survives only because the game deems him necessary.

When fightng in the arena, the best strategy is to stay in the starting area and pick off your enemies with a bow and arrow as they run directly toward you instead of, say, hiding behind one of the many pillars in the arena.

Kathutet invokes this on the Player if he/she chooses to fight him for the Bands of the Chosen instead of doing his task.

Player:"I'll take this key from your corpse."

Kathutet:"Your mind follows the simple path ... the choice of an animal. You see an enemy and you attack it, unthinking. But you have courage, at least. To slay a bold animal like you is not without glory."

Limited Wardrobe: Rich merchants and members of the nobility have a choice of about three distinct outfits, which somehow magically take a gender-appropriate form for the wearer.

Loads and Loads of Loading: Some can experience issues with this, particularly on lower-end systems. Especially if one has a lot of mods in their game.

Locked Door: Probably the most egregious example is with barrels. Just how do you lock a barrel? And even so, why can't you just take a mace to it?

Locked Room Mystery: The quest A Brush With Death is one: the painter Rythe Lythandas entered his study, his wife, possessor of the only extra key, opening the door after he failed to emerge for several days to find him gone... despite the door remaining locked the whole time. As it turns out, he was still in the room.

Lockpicking Minigame: You are shown the one to five pins inside the lock (depending on its complexity) and must use your lockpick to push each one up in succession, then try to set it with a button press before it falls down. The speed at which pins fall back varies, and if you're too slow, your pick breaks and some of the already set pins fall (how many depends on your Security skill). Alternatively, you can Auto Attempt to pick the lock, which either opens it or breaks the lockpick instantly, with the success chance determined by your Security skill.

Alternatively, use Wabbajack, then wail on the poor Daedric Prince. Cue meltinggod.

By "melting god" the refer to the fact that the Mehrunes Dagon character has no proper death animation programmed, and as a result of dying, the skeleton literally gives way and the 3D character model simply collapses to the ground. This will effectively happen with anything that has no proper skeleton installed, but is quite visible here just because Dagon is so damn BIG.

Low-Level Advantage: Many players despise the leveling system used for enemies, firstly since it prevents any real advancement and secondly because it can actually cause a character to become weaker as they level "up". At higher levels, the later effect can cause enemies to become overpowered. The same mechanic can be exploited to become a Game Breaker. note by leveling up your combat skills (which happens independently of your character level, especially if you don't rest in beds or sleeping bags — in which case you'll never level up — or if you choose or build a class in such a way that your "major skills," for which each skill raised counts for 10% of the next level, don't include the combat skills you use the most. Enemies level up based on your character's level, not on your aggregate combat skills. Thankfully there is a difficulty slider if the game mechanic goes pathological.

A popular mod, "Oscuro's Oblivion Overhaul", replaces this system with objective levels for enemies and loot, making player leveling meaningful.

Meaningful Echo: An oddly effective combination with Welcome to Corneria: " The Emperor is dead, and so are his heirs. We're a Legion without a leader. The Blades were entrusted with our Lord's protection... and they failed." It starts out as a pedestrian bit of atmospheric worldbuilding, but begins sounding more and more like a well-aimed personal accusation in two ways: gradually, and then suddenly.

Monster Closet: Happens in Ayleid Ruins, though this is at least handwaved by the fact that Ayleid ruins are notorious for being booby-trapped.

Moral Guardians: There was a huge controversy shortly after the game was released when a nude mod was released that used textures present on the game's DVD. This prompted the ESRB to re-examine the game and re-rate it from T to M note The game should have never been rated T in the first place, but that's another matter entirely. , though the nude mod was not the reason for it; they apparently missed some of the prominently displayed burning hanging corpses and other images they deemed "disturbing." Remembering how Take-Two suffered from Hot Coffee, it's surprising they didn't take measures to prevent. note There are now twenty competing female nude mods, three male nude mods, and at least three mods that add actual full-blown sex. If the Moral Guardians ever looked in the Adult section of the modding community, they'd have a heart attack.

Mordor: The appropriately named Deadlands, Mehrunes Dagon's realm of Oblivion.

Kathutet, who you meet in Mankar Camoran's Paradise, is the friendliest (well, the least aggressive) Dremora in the game. In reality, he's just as rude towards mortals as any other Daedra, but he sees the player as a Worthy Opponent for defeating his comrades in the siege of Kvatch, and even agrees to provide you with the means to move on through the related quest, should you agree to do a favor for him. of course, you can just kill him, and carry on like normal.

Considering his "favor" involves releasing an Ax-Crazy, insanely brutal Xivilai and letting him butcher countless innocent civilians who had just managed to seal him in the first place, killing him may be the preferred option.

"Innocent" may be subjective there though... after all, they ARE Mythic Dawn members, who will often be bragging about killing the Emperor and how they think it's great that Mehrunes Dagon will soon be invading Tamriel. Standing by and listening to their conversations may very well be reason enough to unleash the horrible monster upon them.

Mythology Gag: Jiub, the Dunmer who wakes you up on the prison ship at the start of Morrowind and is promptly taken to parts unknown, has been made a saint... for wiping out cliff racers.

There is a side quest about investigating a gang of women who seduce and rob men. One of them is called Signy Home-Wrecker. The clue is in the name, chaps!

Never My Fault: After the Fighters Guild guildmaster's son is murdered, she spends up until the very end of the questline putting the blame entirely on you and Oreyn.

Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: During roughly the first half of the Fighter's Guild questline, you and another, high ranking guildmate help the Guildmaster's timid son grow in confidence to prepare him for when he inherits the guild. The good news is that it works, the bad news is that he becomes a little too confident, boldly charges into a cave full of trolls, and gets slaughtered when he gets mixed up in a fight between the trolls and a group Blackwood Company mercenaries under the effects of Hist. The Guildmaster is not pleased by this.

An earlier quest has another cave full of trolls that will probably get him (and you) knocked out instantly. It's considered a better idea to go into the cave beforehand and kill them one by one first.

In the "Where Spirits Have Lease" quest, you end up playing right into the monster of the sidequest's hands. Thankfully, you're able to correct your error immediately afterwards.

Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: In the immensely popular mod "The Lost Spires", Kal Rythor could very well have succeeded in summoning Zyyrif he hadn't given his pendant to the PC in exchange for one of the Plot Coupons.

No Ending: Aside from the fact you can continue playing after the game is over, the fact that the Uriel Septim line has ended, the game finishes with a major question unresolved. Who will be Emperor?

No-Gear Level: Happens during Sanguine's shrine quest, where you cast a spell on the Countess of Leyawiin and her company that causes them all to be stripped naked. It also causes the player to lose their equipment and entire inventory, so you've got to face the guards unarmored and unarmed.

Non-Lethal K.O.: NPC's that are flagged as essential will only be knocked unconscious if their health is reduced to zero, rather than killed, to prevent the player from making quests Unwinnable.

The females of the three Daedric races (Dremora, Golden Saint, and Dark Seducer) and other lesser Daedra (Flame Atronachs, Spider Daedra) have breasts, despite the fact that Daedra cannot produce life.

Noodle Implements: At his shrine, Sheogorath asks for an offering of a lesser soul gem, a head of lettuce and some yarn.

Noodle Incident: We never find out what exactly happened to Archmage Traven to make him hate necromancy so much.

The Nudifier: In Oblivion, there is a quest for the Daedric Prince Sanguine which requires the Player Character to cast the spell "Stark Reality" at a dinner party. The spell strips everyone in the vicinity to their undergarments. The Ring of Disrobing in Shivering Isles has a similar effect.

O-Z

Obvious Beta: Despite being an overwhelming success, this game is plagued by many, many, many major bugs, glitches and serious technical problems. Even with an unofficial patch for the unofficial patch on top of the latest official patch, numerous Game Breaking Bugs still persist, which can seriously interfere through normal gameplay, such as the notorious "nVidia black screen bug". Cue Cluster F-Bomb.

One Time Dungeon: The Painted World area, a dream sequence that can't be returned to, and Mankar Camoran's Paradise. Also, closing an Oblivion gate destroys that instance, although it's possible (and indeed likely) to find an identical map behind another gate, but completing the main quest line permanently closes all the gates, cutting off access to Oblivion entirely.

Only Mostly Dead: Umaril's main ability. You have to do this to yourself in order to kill him for good.

Our Vampires Are Different: Not drinking blood makes a vampire PC stronger, but with more weaknesses (you become more vampiric the longer it has been since you drank blood). Also, you get infected with the vampire virus if bitten by an NPC vampire, but for some reason NPCs don't get infected when you bite them. Cyrodiil vampires are different from Morrowind vampires, as they were from Daggerfall vampires. An in-game book confirms there are regional breeds of vampires.

Vicente Valtieri has a severe allergy to garlic, but this trait is unique among vampires. Nonetheless, the "vampires are weakened by garlic" myth still exists in Cyrodiil.

Persuasion Minigame: Each NPC has a Disposition score and will only help the PC if it is high enough. The Disposition can be raised with a minigame accessible from the dialogue screen, in which the PC must use four actions (Admire, Boast, Joke, and Coerce) in any order to gain a Disposition boost. Each NPC reacts differently to different actions (increasing or decreasing Disposition by different amounts), and the "weight" of each action shifts randomly every time one is used (higher weight increases the results, whether positive or negative). A high Speechcraft skill increases Disposition gains from liked actions and reduces losses from disliked ones.

Phlebotinum-Handling Requirements: The Divine Crusader equipment set in Knights of the Nine. To use it, you need to go on a long, annoying pilgrimage, and if your Infamy is raised to anything above 1 after you have obtained it, then you must go on said pilgrimage again.

Point-and-Click Map: The world map's fast travel option allows you to skip to the end of the journey instead of hoofing it.

Poor Communication Kills: The Heretics of Cann, a ruin in The Shivering Isles, kidnap people from the marshes and lock them in a dungeon, offering them fine foods, poetry-writing supplies and sensual comfort to prepare them for "The Elaborate Spectacle" (which is described as involving "loving embraces" and "public display of shared pleasure"). Unfortunately, their habit of simply assuming people would naturally think as they do instead of actually explaining their intentions led every single captive to believe that the Spectacle was actually an arena battle to the death. It never ended well.

Promotion Not Punishment: The final Fighters' Guild quest has you working with a disgraced former guild-member and single-handedly bringing down the Blackwood Company by assaulting their headquarters. After you report your success to the Guildmaster, she tells you that for your reckless actions, you are to be stripped of your position as her second in command... because she will be stepping down and offering you her title

Randomly Generated Levels: Like Daggerfall, Bethesda built the non-quest non-Oblivion dungeons out of existing dungeons pieces and randomly spliced them into a "new" dungeon that gets used for every copies instance of that dungeon. Unlike Daggerfall, you aren't busy getting lost, and the dungeon pieces are are much more distinct looking, making it very noticeable (Indeed, there were a few instance of "leftovers" from quests in some dungeons in early versions). Additionally all spawns and loot are randomly chosen from leveled lists.

The terrain is also computer generated through simulated soil erosion. It sounds neat, but it is very noticeably featureless as a result.

Rage Against the Heavens: This is what Umaril is supposedly intending to do in Knights of the Nine, although how exactly isn't clear.

Ratstomp: Subverted. The first Fighter's Guild mission is entitled "A Rat Problem", but when you talk to the owner of the house you discover that the rats are her pets and that the "problem" is that they keep getting attacked by mountain lions.

Retcon: In previous games and source material, Cyrodiil was described as a much more exotic and unique place than how it was potrayed in Oblivion, with a much more fancier and regal looking Imperial City with waterways much like Venice, singing priest clothed by moths, an esoteric, Chinese/Japanese-inspired culture in Nibenay regions and was overall a Fantasy Counterpart Culture for Roman Empire combined with East Asia. In Oblivion, this was mostly abandonded in favour of traditional Medieval European Fantasy with only dubiously Roman-like elements and the rest was vaguely handwaved as being outdated propaganda. This didn't sit well with some fans.

Retirony: Grommok in the Shivering Isles quest Baiting the Trap. Direct quote from his journal - "We're going to head north and explore the area around Niben Bay today. I hope that something else like this turns up on our adventures. Then I'm going to retire!". Depending on the players actions, he either dies or goes insane.

Enforced in the Dark Brotherhood quest Permanent Retirement, which requires the player to kill a newly retired Imperial Legion commander who spent his life investigating and interfering with the Dark Brotherhood's 'operations'.

Revenue Enhancing Devices: The Horse Armor DLC. Long since made into a meme or a Running Gag, even by Bethesda itself — on April 1, 2009 the price of all Oblivion DLC was halved, except for the Horse Armor DLC, which had its price doubled.

Rewarded as a Traitor Deserves: Pulled on Myvryna Arano by Hieronymus Lex in the early Thieves Guild questline; Lex had been using Myvryna to spy on the Guild, but it turns out the Grey Fox had cottoned on to her, so he creates a fake contract to have the player character steal a bust of the late Countess of Cheydinhal Lathasa Indarys from the Chapel Undercroft there. When Lex uses this as an excuse to order a crackdown on the Waterfront, the PC is directed by Methredhel to drop the bust in a cabinet in Myvryna's home and get Lex to check it out. When confronted by this evidence, Lex arrests her on the spot; if she did steal the bust, then she's been playing him, but if she's telling the truth (that the PC standing two feet away watching this is a member of the Thieves Guild and is setting her up), she's still of no use to him, because it means the Grey Fox knows about her. So either way, off to jail she goes.

Rouge Angles of Satin: Anvil's resident Butt Monkey, Norbert Lelles, is the proprietor of a shop whose sign is misspelled to read "Lelles' Quality Mercandise", which draws many amused comments from various NPCs.

Scenery Porn: Lots and lots of it. Especially in Shivering Isles, whose titular region looks a lot like the more "unusual" areas of Morrowind, but some players even complained about seeing grass and forests everywhere. And it's too bad you can only visit Paradiseonce ...

Secret Test: In the end of the Dark Brotherhood quest the Night Mother reveals she knew Mathieu Bellamont was the traitor before he even knew. Instead of telling the Listener to watch out for him she decided to see if her followers were smart enough to figure it out themselves. Turns out they weren't.

The Siege: Mehrunes Dagon's final assault on the Imperial City in the endgame.

Sequel Hook: "When the next Elder Scroll is written, you will be its scribe."

Set a Mook to Kill a Mook: You can use magic to summon monsters that would normally try to kill you on sight when encountered, who will fight other monsters for you, even of their own kind. There's also the Frenzy spell.

Shipper on Deck: Casta Scribonia from Chorrol ships the proprieter of the Gray Mare and the captain of the guard.

Shoplift and Die: Oh yes. Though not as badly done as in Morrowind; normal NPCs don't immediately go apeshit, swarm attack you and try kill you on sight if caught stealing. They do, however, start screaming like morons and any nearby guards will come running. And then if you refuse to pay gold or go to jail, they'll kill you.

Each NPC in the game has an assigned "responsibility" value, which determines how strictly they follow the law and also how they will report violations of the law. While Imperial Waterfront inhabitants might steal food and cheer on a fight rather than report it to guards, shopkeepers will call for the guards if you so much as touch something without paying for it.

One of the first Fighter's Guild missions you can get is a shout out, and Lampshade Hanging to the first Fighter's Guild mission you can get in Balmora, in Morrowind. In Morrowind, you're contracted to kill the rats in a woman's basement. In Oblivion, you're contracted to defend them.

When a gang of thieves take over "The Bloated Float" inn-boat while you're aboard, you have to fight and/or talk your way past all of them. One of the dialogue options is to claim that you're the ship's cook.

In one quest, you have to try and catch a man who's supplying items to merchants by stealing said items from the dead. As part of your proof, you find a book that lists the recently deceased and any items of value they own. One of the names in the list is Oford Gabings - an anagram of Frodo Baggins - and the items listed are ones that he carried in Lord of the Rings: "Travel Cloak with Silver and Green Leaf Fastener", "Enchanted Shortsword with Inlaid Writing", "Leather Bound Travel Journal", and "Gold Ring with Inscription (Cursed?)"

During one of the Dark Brotherhood quests, the player must venture to a lighthouse with a basement. There player finds a decapitated head in a state of decay sitting on a plate called "Mother's Head", which is a reference to Friday the 13th Part 2.

There is quest called 'Whom Gods Annoy,' whose name refers to a similarly named episode of a certain show.

Side Quest: As per Elder Scrolls tradition, there's a hell of a lot of them. In fact, they make up the bulk of the gaming experience.

Single-Use Shield: The Boots of Springheel Jak will prevent you from dying at the end one very, very long fall but are destroyed upon landing. Various exploits exist to survive said fall and still keep the Boots.

Skybox: Utilized exceptionally well. And the number of mods out there to enhance Oblivion's skies even further is mind blowing.

The Dark Brotherhood quest where you are ordered to kill Adamus Phillida with a special arrow. Though even if you're standing really far away and are well hidden from view, somehow the guards will always detect you...

Disected and explained by fans - the script for the arrow (which immediately kills Philida) doesn't activate until a split second after the arrow hits. Unless you're completely invisible, Philida will recognize he's under attack and will immediately report the crime before he croaks.

The Thieves Guild has a quest in which you must stand on a switch in order to open a keyhole on the other end of the room, then fire the key (which has been made into an arrowhead) into the keyhole without stepping off the switch.

Spell Crafting: The game grants the ability to create custom spells to players who progress to a certain point in the Mages' Guild quest line or purchase the Wizard's Tower Downloadable Content. The player chooses a spell's range (self, touch, or ranged), area of effect (single-target or Splash Damage), duration, and effects, and the game automatically assigns a Magicka cost depending on how powerful the spell is, theoretically maintaining game balance. In practice, it is hilariously easy to design game-breakingly powerful spells by combining synergistic effects such as Weakness to Fire + Fire Damage, or assigning a one-second duration to spells that increase the Persuasion skill (which only works in dialogue, which pauses the game clock). The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall and The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind had similar features.

Spell Levels: The game had all spells divided into five difficulty levels (Novice, Apprentice, Journeyman, Expert, and Master), and you could only learn higher-level spells after raising your skill in the corresponding magical school to a certain level.

Spell My Name with an "S": It's Mankar CAMORAN, not Cameron! If you're not sure, check the in-game subtitles and character names.

Spoiler Title: Several sidequests, including but not limited to the following:

One sidequest has Reynald Jemane asking you to find out why someone has been impersonating him. This quest might have been interesting if it hadn't been named "Separated at Birth".

Archmage Traven sends you to retrieve a book from Count Janus Hassildor... but he has an ulterior motive. Which probably won't come as a major twist, considering that the quest is named "Ulterior Motives".

Stable Time Loop: According to the game mod Knights Of The Nine Revelations, the prophet wasn't waiting for a random hero of a noble heart to take up the quest... he was waiting specifically for YOU to come along, because you had traveled back to the first era and met more than a few people, who knew you were from the future. And that statue of the divine crusader you come across in a hidden chamber of an old ruin? That's your petrified body, waiting to awaken in the modern day because they had no other way to get you home.

Stealth Pun: In The Shivering Isles, the first place the player visits on the Isles is called the Fringe, populated by the kind of crazy people you'll expect to meet, making it the "lunatic Fringe".

Sticks to the Back: Averted completely with bladed weapons (daggers, shortswords, and longswords), although instead it becomes "sticks to the side", since the scabbard sticks to the character's hip with nothing visibly holding it in place. The same goes with maces and axes. Played completely straight, however, with two handed weapons, bows, and arrow quivers.

Stripperiffic: The Huntsman Leather shirt and pants. When equipped to females, becomes nothing but a furry bra and tight revealing pants.

Stuck Items: The game won't allow you to drop quest essential items. This is to prevent you from making a quest Unwinnable by losing quest-essential items. Also, said items are weightless. Unfortunately many items will not properly have the "undroppable" tag removed long after they are no longer needed and at least once (Molag Bal's quest) an item that needs to be dropped to complete a quest may get flaged as undroppable. Most of these are unfixed as of the last official patch, requiring fan-made patches to fix (If you are on a console, well, sucks to be you).

Stuff Blowing Up: Delphine Jend of the Bravil Mages Guild prides herself on the creation of the "Enemies Explode" spell, and just loves destruction magic in general.

Suspicious Spending: Ulrich Leland lines his pockets with the extortionate fines he imposes on the citizens of Cheydinhal, raising suspicions among his men, who question how a captain's salary can pay for some of the things in his quarters.

Sympathetic Inspector Antagonist: Hieronymus Lex - one of the Imperial City's Watch Captains - is the Sympathetic Inspector Antagonist to the Gray Fox, leader of the Thieves' Guild in Cyrodiil. In fact, he is one of the only members of the Imperial Watch who even believes the Thieves' Guild exists, and has dedicated himself to becoming a perpetual, overzealous thorn in its side. He mellows considerably after you inform him that he's been reassigned to the city of Anvil... although not without a brief rant about how the Gray Fox must have been behind that, too.He's right.

Although for fun, once you get the Gray Fox cowl, you can put it on in front of him and have him sputter in disbelief at finally catching him.

So many layers of irony were in that 'reassignment'. On one hand, Lex is now unwittingly working for the Gray Fox. On the other hand, it was the Gray Fox who, after so many years of cat-n-mouse evasion between them, hand-picked him to be his head of security. This actually reveals a huge respect for the man.

Take Your Time: With two exceptions, the Daedric invasion of Bruma and tracking down a fake vampire hunter also in Bruma, there's no quest situation that will get any worse if you ignore it entirely. This even includes major battles to defend cities. No, go ahead and play in the Wide Open Sandbox. The Legion of Doom will wait.

Team Pet: The Dark Brotherhood Cheydinhal sanctuary has Schemer the rat, the blue team at the Arena has Porkchop the boar, The Anvil branch of the Fighter's Guild has a dog called Mojo, and Anvil's Mage Guild has an imp called Sparky.

Tech Demo Game: Despite being released in 2006, the game can still stress out many of the newest computers to this day.

Technical Pacifist: You aren't allowed to kill people during Thieves Guild quests, but nothing says they can't die by any means that don't involve you. A good example of this is an early assignment where you need to raid a tomb with a guard. Opening the target grave will result in a ghost spawning, which isn't on the same side as the guard. If done at low levels (or in OOO) the guard won't have magic weapons or offensive spells and will easily die to the ghost.

The Dev Team Thinks of Everything: If you go to the Shrine of Sheogorath after completing the Shivering Isles main quest and so becoming Sheogorath, the quest briefing will be by Haskill instead of Sheogorath, and he'll even comment on the eccentricity of worshipping yourself.

There's actually unique pieces of dialogue for this quest depending on which quest you are currently engaged in the Shivering Isles. It ranges from Sheogorath pondering why his Champion is outside the realm before he even assigned them to do anything, to scolding the player while his Realm is in danger from the Forces of Order. Of course he decides there's always a bit of time for some fun anyway.

"This hardly seems the time to summon me. Not when Order is busy invading My Realm. You mortals are just a hoot. I hate hoots."

In one of the Thieves Guild quests, your contact (a Khajit) sends you to find a member of the Guild that's gone missing. When you return and tell her that he's dead, she responds by flattening her ears in distress, just like a cat!

The Empire: The Imperial Guards appear to be power-hungry and corrupt. The best example of this is the Thieves Guild quests, since rather than being evil you're a Robin Hood type, and are constantly at odds with Heironymus Lex and other Guards.

The Undead: Zombies. Animate skeletons. Ghosts that shriek like bats out of hell, wraiths and liches.

Timed Mission: The Great Gate outside Bruma during the main quest. To a lesser extent, the resolution to the side quest 'A Brotherhood Betrayed'(you only have a day to bring Raynil Dralas down after finding out the truth about him, or else he makes his getaway with what would have been your reward).

Town with a Dark Secret: Cheydinhal, the place where the Dark Brotherhood's base of operations is. But of course, the Count and many others deny it. There is also Hackdirt.

Translation Trainwreck: The German translation suffered from multitude of shortcomings, among them: unwieldy, misleading or incorrect item and spell names and descriptions. Even quest texts had errors. There was bad dialogue, fragements of the english orginal, widely different subtitles and so on. Neither the reviewing press nor the German fans were pleased. The latter rectified many issues with mods.

Trick Shot Puzzle: In "The Ultimate Heist", you need to fire an Arrow of Extrication to open a door.

Troll: Sheogorath, obviously. Unlike the other Daedric princes who either have their preferred niche roles or see mortals as beneath them, Sheogorath prefers to mess with people directly, to either drive them mad or just be a total jerkwad. Most Daedra may have made an artifact that cursed people into evil; he makes a staff that forces four harmless but annoying Scamps to follow a person around. He also helps bring about the end times prophecy of a small village, just because he thinks the village is dull and because they have such a prophecy.

Sanguine is also this, but to a much lesser degree than Sheogorath. Sanguine seems to prefer harmless fun and partying hard over death, evil, or insanity. He's basically the God of Frat Boys.

Clavicus Vile may also be one, but it's accidental and incidental to his actual goals.

Unfortunate Name: Uuras the Shepherd, has been tirelessly mocked by fans as to the way the voice actor pronounces the name "your-ass".

Un-Person: Putting on the Gray Cowl of Nocturnal makes the wearer one. To clarify, the cowl actually removes all traces of the wearer from the memory of reality itself. In other words, reality freaking forgets that you exist once you put in on.

Vicious Cycle: The Greymarch. Also, the fate of the Ascended Immortals in Kamoran's Savage Garden/Forbidden Grotto.

Video Game Caring Potential: Depending on how attached you become to some of the NPCs, you may reload certain battles multiple times to ensure that they survive past the time they're flagged as no longer essential, up to and including the ending.

Video Game Cruelty Potential: The game allows you to kill any non-essential characters in the game (although this may result in you failing quests that you haven't even started), and essential characters can just be knocked unconscious over and over again.

The sheer amount of videos on YouTube about killing certain people (or yourself) in Oblivion is astounding, but admit it, starting random rampages and mercilessly massacring the guards and citizens of Cyrodiil is fun.

Number one on the list of favorite targets is the Adoring Fan, who, if killed, will respawn three days later and reappear at your side, torch in hand and smile on face. The amount of videos of killing him in various manners (including that perennial favorite, death by Dive Rock) is mind-boggling to non-fans who don't fully grasp the relationship between players of Oblivion and the Adoring Fan.

When you talk to the heart-broken fisherman outside Imperial City you have two options: you help him fish, or you laugh hard at his misfortune.

The Wiki notes some strategies for increasing combat skills, including "Use your horse for target practice. If you have obtained Shadowmere, she is unkillable."

The game's own tips suggest killing your own summoned creatures to trap their souls for enchanting.

In the "Shivering Isles" add-on, the paranoid duchess of a city gives you the task to uncover a conspiracy against her, bestows the title of "Grand Inquisitor" upon you, and lends you her torturer. Then you can either take a direct route to find the conspirators... or let your tourturer zap annoying NPCs.

In the Vile Lair DLC, you can buy the Cattle Cell, which contains an unwakable, unkillable prisoner meant as a food source for those who become vampires, but is more useful for target practice.

Vulnerable Civilians: Besides the usual fact that most NPCs are killable by the player, the game's artificial life system means that many characters (especially those who live in small settlements or commute outside the city walls) can be attacked and killed by random wandering monsters, or even in rare extreme cases starve to death or pick fights with each other.

Warp Whistle: You can "Fast Travel" to any of the cities, and most other important locations.

Subverted. A number of hours proportionate to the distance you travel pass in between locations.

The War Sequence: Mehrunes Dagon's assault on the Imperial City at the end of the main quest.

Weaksauce Weakness: One Dark Brotherhood quest requires you to assassinate a man who's allergic to honey; your handler suggests tricking him into drinking a bottle of mead, which paralyzes him, making him easier to kill.

Wham Episode: Through the last three games, the Emperor has been the Big Good who the player has been doing all the missions for. In this one? He dies. At the end of the tutorial mission.

Wham Line: Mankar Camoran's monologue to the player: "The Principalities have sparkled as gems in the black reaches of Oblivion since the First Morning. Many are their names and the names of their masters: the Coldharbour of Meridia, Peryite's Quagmire, the ten Moonshadows of Mephala, and... and Dawn's Beauty, the Princedom of Lorkhan... misnamed Tamriel by deluded mortals." Even after the release of Skyrim, it's still unclear if Mankar was lying or not.

What Happened to the Mouse?: Jagar Tharn's child. According to an ingame book, he fathered a child with Barenziah, the queen of Morrowind, when he seduced her in order to fool her into showing him the way to the Staff of Chaos. Then this child just fades into space ace. Also, lore says that after the events of the very first game, the Staff of Chaos was put away somewhere in White Gold Tower, yet in the game it is nowhere to be found.

Players finally got an answer to this in Skyrim. It wasn't actually Tharn's child; he hired a famous thief to seduce Barenziah. Finishing the Thieves Guild quest line in Skyrim gives access to the book which explains that the Dragonborn has actually been working with the grandchild of Barenziah and the thief for several missions.

In-game, several quest-related NPCs are usually disabled and removed from the game once their related quest is finished. Often, this is done without any in-universe explanation whatsoever. The most egregious examples are J'Skar (the sole survivor of the attack on the Bruma Mages Guild), and Nelrene (the Dark Seducer involved in the conspiracy in the "Lady of Paranoia" quest, even though she ends up helping you in the end).

Wide Open Sandbox: Larger than Morrowindnote By raw square footage anyways. Morrowind's design makes traveling in a straight line impossible without levitation, and it implements a large vertical component not present in Oblivion but still far smaller than Arena or Daggerfall.

Law of Conservation of Detail: The size comes at the cost of much of the detail gained in Morrowind. Almost everything not quest related is generated from random lists in place of Morrowind's hand placed loot, and like Daggerfall dungeons were note that is, they are the same in every game, but initially created in this fashion randomly generated by combination of existing parts instead of hand crafted and the world is largely flat.

Perhaps even more touching if you take this motivation is that the Gray Fox may have chosen Lex to defend his wife while he was absent.

One of the reasons that Kathutet agrees to help you reach Mankar Camoran is because he considers you one of these for defeating his fellow Dremora during the siege of Kvatch.

Would You Like to Hear How They Died?: Invoked by the player, of all people. When you kill Andreas Draconis, you have the option of taunting him about his mother's death by saying "Your mother bled like a pig."

Wretched Hive: Thieves Den reveals that Anvil used to be this, a seedy, dangerous den of smugglers and pirates, where pretty much everyone was completely under the thumb of the leader of the single most vicious, bloodthirsty pirate group in Tamriel. Only after Admiral Umbranox defeated the pirate captain and his men did Anvil become the respectable harbor town it is today.

Writers Cannot Do Math: As this article points out, there is a subtle (but kind of scary) example in the Arena's method of promoting gladiators. When writing out the means for promoting the player character, Bethesda likely didn't conceive just how exponentially large the killcount would really be when the other gladiators' ranks (and thus number of victories) were considered.

You All Meet in an Inn: Several side quests start at inns. (This usually makes sense, as some of the quest givers are drunks or people who have fallen on hard times.)

You Can't Thwart Stage One: Cutscene Incompetence stops you saving the Emperor from assassins at the start of the game. You arrive at Kvatch the day after The Daedra burn it to the ground, though thankfully Martin, the man you were sent to rescue, survived by hiding in a chapel. You take him back to the priory just as the Mythic Dawn have finished ransacking the place and taken the Amulet of Kings. You can't stop Mankar Camoran fleeing to paradise with the amulet, you need to adventure the length and breadth of Cyrodiil looking for components to build a portal so you can follow him. And even when you finally get the amulet, Mehrunes Dagon still achieves his goal of being summoned to Tamriel.

If you join the Dark Brotherhood, Lucien Lachance can't stop you murdering half of the Brotherhood, all the way up to The Listener. You can't save him when the surviving members execute him for treachery, and the only way you can expose the real traitor, Bellamont, is when he tries to kill the Night Mother, by which time only you and one other Brotherhood leader, Arquen, remain.

And you can only delay Sheogorath's transformation into Jyggalag and the triggering of the Greymarch, not stop it completely.

You Fool!: In a Mages' Guild quest, a count's steward informs you that the count wishes to meet you outside of town at 2 am. The steward shows up there with a couple of necromancers, tells you that he tricked you, and tries to kill you. The count himself arrives and helps save you. Afterward, he angrily says: "You impossible fool. What possessed you to think I would suggest a meeting here, of all places?"

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